Royal Ottawa Health Care Group, Ottawa, ON, Canada; Carleton University, Department of Psychology, Ottawa, ON, Canada.
Int J Law Psychiatry. 2022 Jul-Aug;83:101804. doi: 10.1016/j.ijlp.2022.101804. Epub 2022 Jun 27.
Three studies examined the psychometric properties of a new scale, the Forensic Stigma Scale (FSS), designed to measure public stigma of forensic patients. In Study 1, the initial item pool was derived to measure three components of stigma (stereotypes, prejudice, discrimination). An EFA (n = 218) identified a two-factor model with 12 items. In Study 2, this two-factor solution was confirmed using CFA with a separate sample (n = 326) which had good-excellent fit indices. All 12 items loaded (> 0.40) on the two latent factors (Dangerousness/Unpredictability [7 items] and Responsibility/Blame [5 items]) identified in the EFA. In Study 3, using the combined samples from the previous two studies, the 12-item FSS showed promising internal consistency reliability (0.75-0.80) and demonstrated satisfactory-good criterion validity; the scale was moderately correlated with a similar construct and was able to differentiate individuals who did and did not have specific education on forensic psychology. IRT analyses demonstrated that both subscales had discrimination parameters in the moderate-high range (α = 1.03 to 2.54), though the threshold parameters (b) on the Dangerousness/Unpredictability subscale showed better distribution across trait levels. Overall, the 12-item FSS demonstrates strong psychometric properties, especially the Dangerousness/Unpredictability subscale. The scale may provide clinical and empirical uses for measuring public stigma of forensic patients.
三项研究检验了一种新量表——法医污名量表（FSS）的心理计量学特性，该量表旨在衡量公众对法医患者的污名。在研究 1 中，初始项目池是为了衡量污名的三个组成部分（刻板印象、偏见、歧视）而设计的。一项 EFA（n=218）确定了一个包含 12 个项目的两因素模型。在研究 2 中，使用来自独立样本（n=326）的 CFA 验证了该两因素解决方案，该模型具有良好到极好的拟合指数。所有 12 个项目（>0.40）都加载在 EFA 中确定的两个潜在因素（危险/不可预测性[7 个项目]和责任/责备[5 个项目]）上。在研究 3 中，使用前两项研究的综合样本，12 项 FSS 表现出良好的内部一致性可靠性（0.75-0.80），并具有令人满意的良好标准有效性；该量表与类似的结构中度相关，并能够区分是否接受过法医心理学特定教育的个体。IRT 分析表明，两个子量表的辨别参数都处于中高范围（α=1.03 到 2.54），尽管危险/不可预测性子量表的阈值参数（b）在特质水平上的分布更好。总体而言，12 项 FSS 具有很强的心理计量学特性，特别是危险/不可预测性子量表。该量表可能为衡量公众对法医患者的污名提供临床和实证用途。
